Consumer-safety chief urged to resign after recalls

WASHINGTON -- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called for the resignation of the chief of the Consumer Product Safety Commission yesterday in the aftermath of the recall of millions of Chinese-made toys.

WASHINGTON -- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called for the resignation of the chief of the Consumer Product Safety Commission yesterday in the aftermath of the recall of millions of Chinese-made toys.

Nancy Nord, the agency's acting chief, has been under fire in Congress for opposing Democrats' legislation to overhaul her agency.

"Any commission chair who does not, in the face of the facts that are so clear, say we don't need any more authority or any more resources to do our job, does not understand the gravity of the situation," said Pelosi, who has been joined in her call for Nord's resignation by other Democrats in the House and Senate.

Nord, in an Oct. 24 letter to the Senate Commerce Committee, said a Democratic bill doubling the agency's funding and giving it greater authority to inspect and recall products "could have the unintended consequence of hampering, rather than furthering, consumer product safety."

The White House also opposes the legislation passed unanimously by the Senate Commerce Committee yesterday.

Despite the opposition, the committee sent legislation to the full Senate that would increase the number of workers at the agency to at least 500 by 2013, modernize its testing facilities and increase the number of safety inspectors at U.S. ports.

Under the bill, the agency's budget would go to $80 million in 2009 and increase 10 percent each year after that.

More than 21 million toys made in China have been recalled because of excessive levels of lead paint and other potentially serious problems.

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